After saying good-bye to Felicity in the morning, we departed from Dahab at 8 am to return to Cairo. I was really sad to leave this nice place, as I could have easily stayed another day or two in this relaxing and comfortable environment - although I was looking forward to non-salty water facilities again! (I had washed my clothes here but needed to re-do them in Cairo because the salt made them feel really weird.) Aswan had been my favourite place on the tour so far, but now it had fallen into second place just behind Dahab..

The day was basically a day on the bus and if you read my description of previous bus rides, you can guess how I spent it - sleeping of course. Except when Vincent had to wake me up for my passport when we left theSinai because the police at the "border crossing" wanted to check my visa. Only mine, none of the others, God knows why. As long as they let me pass, I didn't care.. Landscape-wise we first passed a lot of rocky mountains in the Southern part of Sinai. What was amazing was the variety of their colours: Apart from regular grey, desert-yellow and all shades of red-brown, I also saw white mountains, deep purple and even blue ones! This must be paradise for geologists. The more North we came, the more the mountains gave way to flat desert: greyish dusty lands, sprinkled with rocks and dry bushes, which reminded me of American plains in cowboy movies. Somehow desolate. Somewhere on the way, I had my 'encounter of the day' with a very special family: a snow-white cat, one eye blue and the other one amber-coloured, was nursing her babies in a cardboard box outside a rest stop where we had stopped for food, drinks and for those who needed a toilet. She had about 6 kitties, most of them white and I would guess about 6 weeks old. Later they came out of their box and played in a corner behind the visitors' terrace, always protected by their mother. They were so cute!

Finally, we arrived at our hotel at 4:30 pm after 8,5 hours drive, out of which the last hour was entirely spent in Cairo's chaotic traffic. Unfortunately, my very first impression of Egypt's capital just got confirmed after the tranquility of Dahab, the desert, and any other place we've been in the past two weeks: Cairo IS loud, smoggy, hot and dirty. In other words, I really don't like it. A comforting bonus was the fact that, as Felicity was no longer with us, I got a room on my own and was very releaved to find out that my fear of the bathroom was baseless: I got a very nice, big room, compared to my first night almost a suite I would say. The bathroom was okay and I even had a prehistoric telephone and an ancient television in my room. Before going for dinner, we had a little break which I spent watching TV - something I haven't done for ages. The reception was lamentable but there was one English channel and guess what - Friends was on! So I watched Monica's and Chandler's wedding with Egyptian subtitles...

Later we went for dinner to a Lebanese restaurant in the neighbourhood before finally saying good-bye to each other. Some people still went to the market afterwards but since I didn't want to buy anything anyway, I set off for another internet session. Did I say I already had my 'encounter of the day' today? Well, this was only until I had the hugest cockroach climbing up my leg at the internet cafe! At first, I didn't know what was tickling me there, so I wiped it away with my bare hand - just to see this gigantic biest crawling away on the floor... I was so proud of myself that I didn't scream out load. Instead I managed to stay super cool and forced myself not to think any further of this exemplar or his hundreds brothers and sisters that were still hiding somewhere around me... The day ended with me watching TV again (I simply had to take the occasion); although I knew the movie "The General's Daughter" I enjoyed seeing it again.